Wednesday, October 17, 2007 Pacquiao-Barrera II draws $17M PPV
MANNY Pacquiao again displayed his hold in the US households as he drew an estimated 350,000 pay-per-view buys in his last fight against Mexican legend Marco Antonio Barrera last Oct. 6 at the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada.
The Pacquiao-Barrera rematch was sold for $49.95 and both boxers are expected to split the $17,482,500 total buys after the promoters take their cuts.
According to reports posted at boxingconfidential.com, the joint Will to Win promotions of the Golden Boy Promotions and Top Rank Inc. the 350,000 viewers is nearly equal to the concluding fight in the Pacquiao-Erik Morales trilogy.
The number is even bigger than the WBC super featherweight championship between Barrera and Juan Manuel Marquez (225,000) fight back in March and the WBA welterweight championship of Zab Judah vs. Miguel Cotto (225,000) in June and the 12-rounds no title fight of Bernard Hopkins and Winky Wright (300,000) last July.
“Manny has proven once again that American boxing fans want to watch him fight, that he is the most interesting boxer of the moment,” Pacquiao’s business associate Rex “Wakee” Salud told Sun.Star Cebu yesterday.
Relative success
For fights not involving Oscar De La Hoya, matches that draws more than 200,000 PPV buys is already considered a success.
On the other hand, aside from the pay-per-view figures is the live gate receipt that amounted to $3 million.
Mandalay Bay Events Center drew a total of 10,112 spectators in the rematch.
As agreed during the settlement; if Pacquiao fights a GBP fighter, Top Rank will get 57 percent share, while the Golden Boy Promotions gets the remaining 43 percent of the net proceeds.
Share
Of the 57 percent that Top Rank will get, Pacquiao will get the 45 percent while Bob Arum’s promotional outfit will get the remainder.
Pacquiao’s sole earning is the television right for the Philippines, which was earlier reported at $2 million.
“If the negotiations will come into full terms, Pacquiao will fight with David Diaz for the WBC Lightweight title and if he will be successful, then the unification match with the WBA/WBO/IBF champion Juan Diaz will materialize. And that’s where the big money will come from,” Salud said.
Diaz, nicknamed the Baby Bull, has openly announced his intention to fight Pacquiao right after he defeated Julio Diaz for the unification bout last Sunday.
According to Juan, it is the right time that Pacquiao faces a younger Mexican after he kept on beating older Mexicans.
“The fight against David (Diaz) is much more viable that any of the other fighters in the super-featherweight division. For sure the Marquez fight will be a problem because Marquez is asking too much money (just like the botched rematch in 2005) and the sharing with the Golden Boy Promotions will only make Manny’s income lesser,” Salud said. (RCM)
